BRICK – The Brick Township Board of Education opted against approving resolutions that would have reinstated several school district professionals. Most Board members remarked that they didn’t want to automatically reinstate those professionals in favor of seeing what other firms had to offer the school district.
Those resolutions for the 2025-2026 school year included the recommendation of FVHD Architects, Netta Architects and Spiezle Architectural Group as the Architects of Record, Bright View Engineers, CME Associates and Remington & Vernick Engineers, as the Civil Engineers of Record, NW Financial as the Financial Advisor of Record and Labor Counsel to the Taylor Law Group, Legal Counsel Services to Montenegro, Thompson, Montenegro & Genz, Legal Counsel for Special Education Matters Services to the Weiner Law Group and peer review to Jump Perry and Company.
Board President Madeline Iannarone said, “I believe strongly to review our professionals’ contracts annually. This is a common and sound practice across New Jersey and ensures transparency, accountability and opportunity to consider a full range of qualified professionals.
“Our current professionals are welcome to reapply and provide their service during any hold over period so we are not going to be without any services during this period. Our competitive RFP (Request For Proposal) provides the Board and public confidence that these important positions are filled based on merit and best value,” she added.
Board Vice President Mike Mesmer explained his no vote saying, “there are just certain services that in their contracts they can have automatic renewals where they just renew every year. You don’t look at service levels or certain specifications of the contracts or where we are compared to the market. We aren’t trying to bargain hunt; we are looking for the best vendor in each situation.”
Board member Alison Kennedy said, “we are all paying more for groceries and other things right now. Our (income) doesn’t go as far, unfortunately and with what our government is giving us, it is even less. We need to find out what the package deal to support our students is and we need to make sure as we would if our auto insurance went up or health insurance went up. You want to do your due diligence.”
In other news, Board member George Malgeri reported that the Facility Committee met on June 16 and noted several air conditioning projects were discussed at district schools. Several kitchen improvement projects were also underway.
The Finance Committee also met last month and Malgeri said the first item was discussion of the 2025-2026 budget and discussion of the district’s solar project. Substitute teachers and grant writer services contracts are still being reviewed by the committee.
The Drum Point Elementary School PTA has expressed interest in playground improvements. “It was discussed that this was not included as part of the 2025-2026 budget. Other school playground improvements that were discussed were either funded by pre-school funding or through township grants,” he added.
Frequent Brick BOE meeting attendee Vic Finelli noted that there were 146 non-tenured teachers on the list which suggests they were hired in the last four years or less. He also asked for an explanation of what an ‘optimal comprehensive universal screener’ was as that position was on the agenda to be hired for approval.
Curriculum Director Alyce Anderson told Finelli that an ‘optimal comprehensive universal screener’ was a way to determine students’ abilities. “It helps us assess students. We use something called DIBELS which is Dynamic Indicators of Basic Early Literary Skills.”
“The state offered a grant for $22,500 for us to provide professional learning and support for teachers to respond to the data that we get from that DIBELS screener and it assesses students’ early literacy foundational skills like phonics,” Anderson said.
“You didn’t come up with this name, did you?” Finelli asked.
“I did not,” Anderson replied with a smile. “We wrote the $22,500 grant.”
Finelli replied, “I’m all for grants.”
Anderson responded, “I know, I am too!”
